The Effects of Desegregation on Student Success in the Chapel Hill City Schools.

Prichard, Paul N.

This paper summarizes the research conducted for a doctoral thesis at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in February 1969. It gauges the effect of the complete desegregation of Chapel Hill schools on its fifth, seventh, and ninth grade students. The achievement scores of those students who attended segregated schools during 1965-66 were compared with the scores of the students who later attended desegregated schools. Comparisons were then made between students in grades five, seven, and nine of segregated schools with students at the same grade level who had experienced one and two years of desegregation. Desegregation in itself does not appear to have had any significant negative effects on the academic achievement of either race, the only significant changes having been of a positive nature. In general, Negro students failed a higher percentage of their courses than did white students during the period of this study. However, this may well be due to the orientation of the curriculum and teaching methods of Chapel Hill schools to the average middle-class white student. (JM)